Startled
by muddmm
Summary: Oneshot. Professor Snape startles his apprentice while she's working and learns much more than he bargained for about her role in the war.


_Warning: mentions of abuse and rape. For those of you following A Neatly Laid Trap – this is not a prequel. This is a standalone story. Slight AU. I do not own any of the characters._

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Severus found her brewing in his private labs. Her long, curly hair was tied into a thick knot at the base of her neck, strands escaping to twirl down her back and around her elegant neck. Her pale face was bent over the cauldron, inspecting the fumes of whatever potion it was she was crafting. He watched her for a few moments, giving into the desire that had been steadily growing over the past several months, ever since he had taken the brilliant young witch as his apprentice.

She really was quite exquisite. A classic beauty with large, honey colored eyes flecked with emerald green and a sweet face. Her hair was still a wild creature of mammoth proportions but instead of the bushy haired monstrosity it had been in her school days it was now a waist-length mass of shiny chestnut curls. She was a tiny thing, and one would never know she had wonderfully tight curves unless they saw her as she was now – her apprentice robes thrown over a stool and wearing black muggle leggings and a white collared shirt. He never saw her wear much makeup – she never needed to in his opinion – and the only jewelry she ever wore was a pair of diamond stud earrings and a locket she kept tucked under her shirts.

He glided up silently behind her, curious to see which potion she had decided to brew today. Three weeks ago he had walked in on her brewing but instead of the serene picture she presented today there had been cursing and sweat and the remnants of what he suspected had been an original potion recipe blown all over his pristine white tile lab. She had looked up upon his entry, her delicate hands fisted in her hair and her beautiful eyes practically spitting sparks. She had had the grace to look embarrassed upon sighting his raised eyebrow and sardonic smile.

Now he peered over her shoulder, refusing to admit he inhaled her subtle vanilla and orange scent along with that of the potions floral aroma. The smell, along with the light lavender hue, allowed him to deduce it was some sort of rejuvenation potion. From his position behind her he whispered in her ear, "Is this a variation on the Eternal Youth Elixir, Miss Granger?"

Her reaction was instantaneous.

A shield charm was thrown up so fast he was blasted back a good six feet, though he managed to stay standing for the moment. Hermione quickly got hold of her wand from her waist pocket and threw a silent Expilliarmus and simultaneous Stupefy before he had raised his own shield. Luckily age and experience still made him the superior dueler and he managed to deflect both spells before they made impact. They ricocheted and struck one of the myriad of wooden shelves that were holding up too many potion ingredients. A medley of glass vials and jars fell to the floor, shattered into so many useless pieces, their contents strewn across the tile.

Fuming, he barked at his apprentice. "Miss Granger!"

Her response was another silent Stupefy immediately followed by a body-locking curse for good measure. He again deflected the spells and they again rocketed around the room before destroying a pile of freshly scrubbed pewter cauldrons. "Miss Granger! Desist immediately!"

No reaction from the terrified witch. He saw her chest rise and fall in heavy pants and realized how unfocused her gaze was. _Merlin, she doesn't even recognize me._

Withdrawing as far from his apprentice's person as space would allow, Severus fought his own war honed instincts, lowered his wand, and waited.

Ages later, he saw the light finally return to Hermione's eyes as she beheld the ruined lab with startled eyes. The spells had left several scorch marks on the walls and chipped the white tiled floor. Shelving units that had held a small fortune's worth of ingredients were broken and their burden now lay shattered and impotent on the floor. The witch gave a deep, shuddering breath and at last dropped her shield charm. "Professor, I…"

"What, Ms. Granger?" He snapped. "Pray tell, what excuse could you possibly have at this moment? Hmmmm? I am breathless with anticipation for the motivation behind this… _behavior_ ," he finished, gesturing to the destruction currently surrounding them.

She dropped her eyes and whispered, "You startled me…"

His jaw dropped. They stood in silence for several moments as he glared at her and she stared at the ground. "I _startled_ you?" He drawled incredulously.

Hermione winced, well aware that her reaction was massively disproportionate to her explanation. She waved her wand, attempting to ignore the furious wizard as she vanished broken glass. She was making a mental list of all the ingredients that would need replacing. The monkshood and the eastern moss would be easy enough to replace but it looked like she had also managed to burn several branches of the silver thistle lead and that would absolutely put a large dent in her apprenticeship funds. Luckily she lived mostly off the generosity of the school and needed very little but –

"MS. GRANGER!"

She flinched. The rage in her Potion Master's voice shook the mortar of her quickly crumbling mental foundations and she rapidly blinked to hold back the tears of fear and shame threatening to spill out. He stormed closer until they were merely an inch or so apart. As was her habit now, determined to always look her pompous Master in the eyes when he tried to intimidate her with his looming, she looked up into his night black gaze.

Severus' outrage faltered upon seeing the wet sheen of tears in the witch's eyes. Helplessly, he reached for her but she again flinched away from him. He slowly lowered his hand. The pain of her rejection would have been evident on his face had she been looking but instead she was speaking to their shoes. "I'll replace everything, Professor. You can just take it out of my apprentice wages, I'll –"

He interrupted her diatribe. "Silence." Merlin, but she never seemed to need to take a breath! Her mouth closed with an audible click as she lifted her gaze once more to his. "What I want," he replied, as gently as he was able, "is an explanation."

Hermione's eyes dilated and then her entire body seemed to fold in on itself as she collapsed onto one of the few remaining stools. In silence she rolled up the cuff of her left hand and thrust her forearm at him.

Severus drew in a deep breath as he saw the ugly scar. _Mudblood._ The lines of the letters were coarse and garish, the raised skin shining a slight pink as if it was still healing. The horror of the mark was somehow amplified by the soft, smooth skin of the rest of her arm, the pale blue veins running helplessly under the ruined skin.

He looked up from his appraisal to finder her watching him, a bitter expression on her elvin face.

"Who?" His voice promised deadly retribution.

She seemed to sense the same thing since one of her eyebrows arched in response to his tone. "Bellatrix," she whispered. "We were captured by Snatchers while we were hunting for the horcruxes. The boys were taken to the dungeons but I – " she cut herself off with a helpless sob.

Part of him was pleased. Bellatrix LeStrange had been killed by Molly Weasley in the final battle. But another, much darker part of him wished for the insane woman to still be alive so he could deal with her more appropriately. "What else?" He knew there was more. The scar and the torture inflicted from that alone were enough for anyone else but he knew his lioness was made of stronger metal. It would have taken something truly horrific for her to react the way she had a few moments ago.

Her eyes lost all emotion and her face became blank. Hermione Granger, for all intents and purposes, was gone.

In a wooden voice she replied, "You were a Death Eater once. You know what they do to Mudbloods."

He dropped the arm he was still holding and took a step back from the young woman in front of him, feeling a deep cold cover his soul. He examined Hermione, finally noticing all the little signs and remembering every reaction she had had since coming back to Hogwarts after the war. She hid it well. He imagined the six months she had disappeared from the wizarding world had been spent in therapy dealing with the aftermath and learning coping techniques. But now he remembered all the little twitched away from fingers brushing against each other. All the times she had sidestepped to avoid brushing into anyone unnecessarily. How every time she was in a room she stood by the door for an easy escape. The little flinches she tried to hide whenever a man got to close.

He wondered how long they had had her; how long before the raid the Order had planned on Malfoy Manor managed to liberate her? He wondered how much the other two members of the Golden Trio knew – or guessed. Surely Potter, who was unfortunately almost as familiar with abuse as Severus himself was, would have recognized the signs in his best friend.

Hermione looked up at him then, a little life returning to her dead eyes as she examined his face. Whatever she saw seemed to bring her fully back to the present and she relaxed.

"You didn't know."

It wasn't a question but he answered her anyway. "No," he shook his head, emphasizing his negative answer. "I would have come for you sooner had I know that…" He stopped, unable to voice the word.

He knew rape was an effective tool the Death Eaters used frequently and (for some) quite enthusiastically. While the physical pain was useful for punishment, the emotional toll the act took on the victim was far stronger and the effects longer reach than most other forms of torture. The fact that this brilliant, beautiful woman had suffered so…That the insufferable know-it-all who held such a love for learning and such compassion for humans and creatures other than herself…that she had been subjected to such a brutal form of torture…

He felt a large lump lodge in his throat as his eyes burned uncomfortably. Hesitantly, he took a step towards her, and then another one, until he was sinking onto his knees before her, his head level with her collarbone. He couldn't look her in the face. "I – I am truly, grievously sorry that –" He stopped, choking on bile as he thought of who among his fellow Death Eaters had taken part in her pain. Did they wear their masks and robes as they defiled her? Or was she forced to see their sneering, lust filled faces as they thrust into her unwilling body? She had been young when she and the Weasel and Potter fled Hogwarts. Sixteen, seventeen at most. Has she still been untouched when…?

He felt her warm fingers caress his face and he jerked his head up to look at her. She was wearing a soft smile as she gazed warmly at him. "Severus, I've never blamed you. Not for anything."

She should. He had been cruel to her as a child in school, taking his frustrations and his own pain out on a little girl. And during the war, when had only been trying to help he had lashed out then as well, afraid of anyone seeing him so vulnerable.

He had been in the ranks for Merlin's sake! He should have been notified that the Golden Trion had been captured! That the female Muggle-born who vexed all and sundry was going to be the main entertainment for one of the Dark Lord's revels. He should have known! It was his thrice bedamned job after all, as spy for the Order. He should have known. He could have…

"I could have saved you," he replied miserably.

She shook her head, her tears and her curls shaking wildly with the motion. "No."

"But I –"

"No," she stated more firmly. "You had a job to do. Even if you had been there you would have had to play along. You couldn't have helped me without the risk of exposure. I'm glad you didn't know – they might have made you…participate."

"Never," he replied fiercely, gripping the one hand that still rested on his cheek. "I would not have – I have _never_ – "

She soothed him, stroking his hair as he desperately clutched her. "I know Severus, I know. It's why I agreed to be your apprentice, knowing we would have to be working in close quarters, by ourselves, for many hours. I know you would never hurt me."

The relief and gratitude her statement brought was short lived as he remembered their earlier altercation. His lips quirked in his trademark smirk. "The evidence does not seem to support that theory," he remarked wryly.

He peaceful strokes faltered as her eyes once again took in the demolished potions lab. Sheepishly she shrugged, using one of her hands to wipe the tears from her face. "You startled me."


End file.
